Taliban Kill Seven Soldiers In Afghanistan

Published: May 21, 2006

Militants hiding in a vineyard and armed with machine guns ambushed an Afghan Army convoy on Saturday, shooting dead four soldiers, said Gen. Rehmatullah Raufi, military commander for the south, while two French soldiers and an American were reported killed in fighting elsewhere.

The American soldier was killed Friday in Oruzgan Province, also in the south, the military said in a statement. Lt. Tamara Lawrence, a military spokeswoman, said American troops were conducting a joint patrol with Afghan forces when they encountered enemy fighters about 10 a.m. Friday. Six other American soldiers were injured.

In the past year, Oruzgan has been the site of some of the heaviest fighting in Afghanistan, but militants suffered high losses in battles with coalition forces, and the violence has subsided in recent months.

The two French soldiers, special forces troops, were killed Saturday while fighting the Taliban in Kandahar Province, the French Defense Ministry said. No other details were immediately available.

France has had 200 special forces officers in southeast Afghanistan since 2003 as part of the American-led coalition.

In the western city of Herat, an explosion ripped through a vehicle carrying a former warlord, Amanullah Khan, wounding him and two others, said Gulam Sarwar Haydari, the city's deputy police chief. It was not immediately clear what caused the blast.